What weight-lifting can do for a former anorexic

It still amazes me sometimes, that I should have found not only a physical activity that doesn't fill me with boredom or dread (as all the ghastly team games at school used to), but one that involves going to a gym, one of the human inventions I used to despise more than most others. I despised a lot of things, and a lot of people, during my anorexic years, but gyms seemed to me the epitome of modern madness: that people could pay quite large amounts of money for the privilege of being able to expend energy completely pointlessly in the proximity of lots of other people either unfit or freakishly fit, with not even the benefits of daylight and fresh air to recommend it, and using their exertions on the treadmill or the resistance machines to earn their post-workout indulgence in food or drink. It still does sadden me a little to think of all the time and physical energy being thrown away in gyms all around the world, rather than its being used in some more creative, philanthropic, or in some sense productive way - and I admit to still despising those people who drive there in their 4X4s - and I still find the cardio machines an incomprehensible substitute for walking or cycling out in the real world, whilst laughing at the misery of joggers ruining their knees - but perhaps all that simply means I'm not quite better yet.

Weight-lifter vs. gym bunnies

What I love in the gym doesn't feel as wholly negative as the endeavours of those who run or pedal on the spot for hours on end, purely to see the calories-burned indicator go up and up, purely to lose weight or grow slimmer. I lift weights - and this feels like something positive, because muscle and strength are being noticeably built, rather than fat or energy simply being lost. My boyfriend introduced me to what had for years been his own sport of choice, without little hope of my taking to it, I think. But somehow, from the outset, it seemed right. I found I could lift the bars and dumbbells in the ways that he showed me, and I found a beautiful sense of the cleanness of the movements involved, the pure arc of weights and limbs and muscles moving in highly co-ordinated synchrony, that satisfied something in me I hadn't known to exist previously. I've been aware that the metaphors that naturally come to me in characterising this pleasure are ones with an inglorious history for me and anyone who's known anorexia: purity, cleanliness, simplicity, and their conceptual connections with strength, self-control, and will-power are highly pernicious webs of association that need dismantling if recovery is to be complete, and which need defending against if health is to be safeguarded. But I do think the difference in context makes the resemblance only a superficial one. In the case of anorexia, it doesn't take much insight to see the illusory nature of the associations: there's nothing inherently clean, pure, or simple, about eating too little to support a healthy body, and there's nothing inherently strong, wilful, or self-controlled about not being able to stop starving oneself despite feeling the havoc doing so is wreaking with one's body, mind, and life in general. Purity, simplicity, and strength are the last attributes that can be properly applied to minute rules about numbers of grams of permitted foods, to feverish concern with bowel movements and the prominence of certain bones, to the freezing cold, the muscle wastage and organ shrinkage, the oedema and amenorrhoea and lanugo, that may come to define the anorexic's body.

With weight-lifting it's different. The clean lines of the squat or the shoulder press induce an aesthetic response to their beauty when properly executed; the sensation of certain muscle groups pushing against a certain amount of weight is simple and, when completed, delightful; the possibility for making continuous progress is mentally satisfying. I do worry, sometimes, about some other aspects of my liking for this sport - though much of that worry may be born of simple incredulity that I can enjoy a sport this much. Firstly, there's the danger of its becoming something compulsive rather than merely pleasurable. Many men and women who lift weights do so for aesthetic reasons, to gain muscle as an end in itself, rather than to gain muscle for strength; they tweak muscle growth in minute ways through exercises that have no real effect on strength, and reduce body-fat as much as possible to make the muscles maximally visible. (Just to clarify the terminology: they are body-building rather than weight-lifting (involving the Olympic lifts: the clean and jerk and the snatch) or power-lifting (back squat, deadlift, and bench press). We're following Mark Rippetoe's Starting Strength programme), a mixture of Olympic and power-lifting, so what we're doing might best be called ‘strength-training'.) There are plenty of obsessive body-builders, and my boyfriend was, in the past, one of them: he tailored his diet to what the T-Nation gurus recommended, imported expensive protein powders, and believed it to be his means to achieving the nirvana of having a six-pack, and all the personal happiness to which that would inevitably lead. The start of our relationship put an end to that, since he understood how effectively such food-related obsessions would prevent my being happy with him and able to recover fully, and because he was so starved (in his careful, scientific way that nonetheless bore so many resemblances to my pathological way) that it took little for him to embark on a phase of eating too much - from which he then learned, along with me, the importance of finding a middle path. We've discussed the balance that needs to be struck between living such that the weight-lifting can be fulfilling (eating more at certain times, not drinking alcohol at certain times), and living such that the rest of life is fulfilling too - such that one can be spontaneous in social contexts, and enjoy food as more than a fuel for lifting. We've compromised: I've started drinking a protein shake most afternoons, in addition to my usual tea-time biscuits, and having egg in my porridge on work-out days, and he's practised not imposing the requirements of the strength-trainer on our lives much more than that. I struggled a bit initially to add a banana before we set off, but I've noticed how it helps, and now the reasons for doing so win out in the little internal argument that is initiated by the knowledge that it's not long since breakfast, and the feeling that I don't really need it.

It might be argued that starting strength training is a silly thing for an only recently recovered anorexic to do. Eating disorders often go hand in hand with exercise obsessions, and the only reason that for me the latter was never a great problem was that work mattered more to me than losing more weight - or at least, the proof of my power was the flawless balancing of the two - and that hours spent exercising should have been hours spent thinking, reading, and writing. Now that my need to work every waking hour has grown gentler, I might in theory be more susceptible to the feeling that I could compensate for food with more exercise. But I know that this isn't the case. I simply don't think that way any more, and have little fear that I might ever do so again. For another thing, the three work-outs a week don't offer much scope for a growing obsession: I can feel my muscles worn out by the time we've finished, and needing the two or three days till next time simply to recover.

There are also little worries about food and body image. Amongst them is not, however, the fear which prevents many women from taking up weight-lifting: the fear that it would inevitably lead to their becoming less feminine - for which read: overly muscled. Women, thanks to their lower testosterone levels, simply don't have the capacity to put on muscle mass as men do, and if anything I feel more ‘feminine' for the changes that have occurred in me. I also feel empowered: it's good not to be just a weak fragile girlie, but a strong but still curvy woman. (Stumptuous.com is a good blog on women and weight-lifting.) So, my worries aren't worries about having problems with food or body image things, but worries about having no problems at all really - which makes me wonder whether I've become dependent on the strength-training to make certain aspects of life easier. One issue is food: it takes a lot of energy to squat, for instance, one's body weight in bar and weight plates for three sets of five repetitions, and then go on to do the same number of repetitions of the bench press and power clean. This means that I can eat more without worrying about gaining fat, because the energy will go into muscle reparation and structural changes within my body instead. But does that mean that I am legitimising my food intake with reference to some abnormally high energy requirements, allowing myself to think that I'm relaxed about what I eat, when in fact I'm relaxed only if I know I'll be in the gym three times a week? Another facet of the same question is whether this is what now allows me not to mind comparisons with what and how much other people eat, because this aspect of my life serves to make my intake incomparable with theirs. Yet another angle is that of the effects, visible and tangible, on my body, and comparisons with the bodies of others: perhaps I feel calm about most women I see now being slimmer than me because where I used to focus feverishly on other women's tummies and upper arms, I can now focus on the more constructive but perhaps no less pernicious fact that most of them lack the muscles, and hence the strength, that I am so enjoying acquiring.

I've thought through all this quite a lot, and ultimately I think the key is as simple as that: enjoyment. It's really fun going and lifting heavy weights with my boyfriend before lunch. I like the lifting itself, and I like the effects it has on my body, my energy levels, my strength, and my mood. I think it's right for me to be cautious about all these phenomena, but that they are in fact the effects of simply being happy doing something. It is possible to make oneself anxious about something which could, if one just dared to stop worrying, be a wholly good thing, and I've no wish to risk doing that. And at least one aspect of it all is entirely beneficial as far as the former anorexic is concerned: it makes body weight mean more than the sliding scale from thin to fat. It makes gaining weight something to welcome rather than be apprehensive about, because what is being weighed is the muscle, bone, and cartilage as well as fat, and more of these means the possibility of more progress, more strength, more satisfaction. I don't weigh myself often - once a month or so - but when I do it's lovely not particularly to care what the numbers say: to do it out of curiosity mainly, and almost be pleased if I weigh more. This is the most positive freedom I can imagine from the anorexic tyranny of the numbers: that less - further progress towards emaciation and death - is always more - more proof of strength, will-power, and all the rest.

This brings me to a final issue about weight-lifting and anorexia, which I've never suffered from myself but which another blogger has made me think about more seriously. This is the difficulty with which the former anorexic may confront the need to eat more at the outset, to get anywhere with lifting, even if she appreciates the positive effects that lifting may have on her body-image, self-esteem, physical strength, and so on. A vicious circle may arise in which one does not dare to eat enough to be able to lift anything much, even whilst one knows that only by lifting can one dare to eat more because it'll be going towards building muscle instead of fat. However, the basis of such a paradox is the desire to put on ‘good weight' rather than ‘bad', whereas of course for the anorexic trying to recover all weight is good. Recovery will never be successful if in the weight-gain stage any restrictions are placed upon the way in which one is willing to gain weight, because a starved body responds to increased intake in ways that are unpredictable precisely because adequate nutrition has hitherto been absent. Organs and bones, teeth and skin and hair, all require the new nutrients to restore themselves, and fat deposits will be made unevenly, and in ways that may seem uneven because of a lack of underlying muscle. The tummy, for instance, may seem to get bigger more than anything else, but this is because the abdominal muscles are so wasted. In psychological terms, of course, if one expects weight gain to have effects that may be considered ‘positive' (e.g. muscle growth) but not those thought of as ‘negative' (e.g. gaining fat), one is being unrealistic and at the same time sustaining the mental entrapment that anorexia entails.

In my own case, something - a combination of desperation, determination, and a good deal of luck and help - allowed me to decide to eat and not stop doing so until I reached a healthy weight, or felt ‘well' again. I initially didn't believe the latter would ever happen, but by the time I reached a BMI of 20, I was sure that it would, but that it hadn't yet - so I continued to eat until my BMI was 26, and then my eternal hunger at last subsided: I felt for the first time in 12 years that I'd eaten enough, and I eased off the second helpings and the extra snacks, and my BMI gradually dropped back to 24 or so. I first tried weight-lifting somewhere towards the latter end of this process of instinctive weight gain, and thus I never had the problem of insufficient energy intake to make it work. I find myself feeling almost guilty sometimes, when I write about how I recovered, because for so many others I've talked and otherwise communicated with, that way is for whatever reason an impossibility. It may seem as though I'm ignoring the difficulties others may find insurmountable, or as though I was never really as ill as some of those others, or as though I'm implying there is some magic switch I managed to switch but so few do. None of these things is true, I think: sufficient things in my past and present came together to make that new way of eating, and keeping on eating, possible - and indeed the only possibility. And weight-lifting was one of those things.

Without it I would never have learnt what a delight physical exertion - and physical strength - can be. Without it I wouldn't have realised that body shape and composition could be defined by anything other than variations on the spectrum from thin to fat. I wouldn't have experienced the ironic thrill of bench-pressing what I used to weigh, and dead-lifting double that. I wouldn't have known the happiness of allowing my body to grow to be as strong a support to me as it can be. It's something that very few women in the UK would ever consider taking up - but with a good trainer to help one learn it properly there's no reason not to. It's a brilliant way of breaking the cardio conception of exercise as weight loss, and of finding one more way of coming to peace with one's own body after maltreating it so comprehensively.

I just want to congratulate you. I discovered Mark's starting strength a few years ago, and like you, it is not too much to say it changed my life. At 48, I am stronger, feel better, am more useful, than ever. My wife, 51, has started to squat (just squat - that's enough for her) about 6 months ago, and the changes are also amazing - her knees, which for years were painful, no longer bother her at all.

Btw, if you don't read his forum, you should - he is one of the funniest and wisest of us around...

It's lovely to hear that you and your wife have also found the programme so enjoyable and beneficial; I hope I shall still be squatting at 51. The forum is good fun, yes - my partner occasionally reads me out juicy bits, including the not infrequent instances of his amusingly undoing the various stupidities and vanities people come there with.

Thank you for the encouragement, and I wish you both well with your own training.

I loved this piece. I think you beautifully articulated not only exercise and anorexia (two topics which I'm sad to be overly familiar with) but of the lingering questions, the internal debates, that persist long after the initial weight is gained in the recovery process. To be sure, anorexia is part of us - not only as an illness, but as a manifestation of our personalities, weaknesses, and fears - and so will inevitably play a role in our lives and hobbies post-recovery.

Thank you for such an insightful, information-packed, beautiful post. Good luck to you and your (healthy!) lifestyle!

Many thanks for your kind words about the post. You're right about the lingering dialogues and heightened sensitivities that anorexia leaves in its wake - but despite all that, it is possible not to become obsessive about exercise or eating, and simply to enjoy life and one's own new-found capacities to engage with it fully. I thus wouldn't say that anorexia itself remains in me, or part of me, but rather that what remains are some of its after-effects and some of traits which made me susceptible to it in the beginning. I hope your experience of reovery has been similarly positive.

"I still find the cardio machines an incomprehensible substitute for walking or cycling out in the real world,"

Here is one person's reason for loving cardio machines:

I am in love with elliptical machines. Why? Because when it's not allergy season I love to walk outdoors, but in Southern California, having sinus headaches and dizziness to get some fresh outdoor air exercise is not ideal. Secondly, I was always a bookworm as a child--usually munching away on junk food with my head in a book.

No longer having the childhood metabolism so I can snack mindlessly with abandon, but loving books still, it's wonderful to work up a sweat on an elliptical machine, burn off some stress from my desk job and have my nose in a book. And yes, it burns calories--calories I'd much rather enjoy consciously than with my head in that book at this point in my life.

Additionally, elliptical motion doesn't aggravate my knees or back as much as walking on cement. Wait till YOU are over 40 (or hopefully you'll find this out even later) and you will understand...

As I type this the temperature out of doors is 5 deg F. Snow and ice are piled high. Now, the temps are not necessary the obstacle, it is the ice, then snow piled on top of that, then more ice. Freeze, thaw, freeze. Hazardous to say the least. So for those of us who have months of winter weather, the gym is the place to be - at least until the snow melts.

Thanks for these thoughts. I understand about the hayfever. Many people say that lifts like the squat, properly performed, can help a good deal with joint problems (the first comment posted to this blog may be of interest to you in this regard), and the sets and reps can be manipulated to have a strong cardio-vascular effect - whereas any sport/exercise that involves impact on the joints may result in further damage. If it's calorie-burning you're interested in, a short time with the weights can do a whole lot more, and raise one's metabolism in the long term by building muscle - but admittedly it's hard to read a book at the same time.

Fair enough - the English winters tend to be rather milder than what you describe (it was quite exciting to us to have two weeks of snow in December this winter). I suppose one could always have fun shovelling snow from the garden path or whatever, but no doubt the charm of that wears off after a month or two.

Another great post, and one that I think might prompt me to write one of my own in the future. When I first read parts of it, I was defensive in that I don't classify myself as an anorexic in the typical way. If anything, it's exercise bulimia. But as I continued to read on I realized that many of my fears were exactly as you described.

Although I have memories of being strong and fit, they often aren't enough to prompt me to be "still" in the interim. I can't seem to justify sitting and doing nothing while I gain to a weight that makes weight lifting beneficial. As illogical as I know it is, I do want the weight I gain to be muscle--to be the "good" weight--right away. I know any weight would be "good" weight at this point, but I have a hard time letting go of the attachment to that control.

My motivation for exercise is often to justify additional food that I want, whereas before my motivation was increased strength and progress. This twisted logic is hard to unwind when you're caught in the throes of the disease. It's hard to trust the process. But now I'm rambling...thank you for getting me thinking once again!

Thanks for writing - and I'd be very glad to read something of your own along these lines in future. You certainly inspired me to write this post, and to include some of the issues I did, so thank you.

I guess thinking in all-or-nothing terms - one of the great addictions of the eating-disorder sufferer - is something to be avoided here, too, if possible: not thinking of anything preceding being able to lift again as 'sitting and doing nothing', but thinking of that time as a period in which to be kind and encouraging to your body: feeding it plenty, going for gentle walks or little bike rides, enjoying feeling real energy returning, liking knowing that all the invisible parts of you that need indulging, too, to get better - bones, cartilage, organs, etc. - are also starting to flourish. Being gentle with oneself may seem a million miles away from either exercising to earn one's food, or exercising to get stronger - but it is of course the necessary first step towards the latter, whilst perhaps helping to weaken the assumptions behind the former. And after all, simply being at rest requires ('justifies') the majority of your daily energy needs - whilst sitting thinking and writing, which you clearly do plenty of, will be eating up a lot more!

Maybe if you're still controlled by the obsession with control you could try reflecting on what you mean by that word. As the phrasing of that last sentence implies, it's not you who's actually 'in control' in this situation, since you see the illogicality and the drawbacks so clearly yet continue to act in the way you're calling 'exercising control' but which you rationally recognise to be the opposite. I found it helpful to think of the control I was exerting by eating the extra pain au chocolat and custard tart (in the very beginning of my recovery) as a far truer, 'purer' kind of control than the one I'd been in thrall to for so long whilst refusing these things. This was now actually me deciding and then acting accordingly, whereas for years the illusion of control had been nothing but long-since congealed habits and fear of change. Eating was not initially letting go of, or losing, control (although 'letting go' was what it came to feel like later), but turning my well-proven will-power on its head: making it serve me by making eating possible (and necessary) rather than by making it impossible. This requires a comprehensive mental revolution, of course, which either works for you or doesn't, but it did for me. Giving your body what you know it needs - and what it will respond to so positively -, rather than letting the pseudo-reasons for denying it everything stay in control, can feel beautiful.

As a recovered anorexic, i relate to a lot of what has been said, but disagree with other aspects. recovery is a process of maturing and finding a relationship with your mind and body. i would not advocate weight lifting until a bone scan has been performed and the individual can be trusted not to use lifting as any form of 'deservance around food.'

i took an atypical approach to recovery and continue to advocate a real food based recovery and acceptance where recovery begins at. please, if you are still suffering in an eating disorder trust that the obsession will end, 'you' will come back and what is really wrong with you is a byproduct of malnutrition. check out my blog, it may really benefit a good number of people.

I hope I said nothing in this post - or any other - that would contradict the notion that recovery should be a 'real food-based' process, or one of 'maturing and finding a relationship with your mind and body'. Anorexia cannot be escaped from without simply eating, for months and months, much more than at first one believes possible, to counter all the many symptoms of malnutrition; nor is eating alone sufficient without the development of a more forgiving, kinder, more constructive relationship with one's own body, and an acknowledgement of how inseparable body and mind are. What it means to 'mature' is more debatable, since most anorexics are in no sense childlike - but if maturing is about all the above, then of course it needs to happen.

Lifting weights was not presented as a means to recovery, nor as a sensible thing to take up whilst one's weight is still below the healthy range - but it was recommended as a way of breaking free of the concept of exercise as merely a way of controlling weight: if I exercise more I'll stay thinner. Gaining strength by rebuilding all sorts of withered tissues, coming to be able to rely on one's own body, learning to trust it to demand what it needs and in return do what you ask of it - these are all important aspects of the later stages of recovery, once all the necessary weight has been regained.

Hello from Pennsylvania! I am an Olympic Weightlifter.I was looking for articles on how the Olympic lifts psychologically benefit other athletes in their respective sport. And BAM! I came across your wonderfully written article and inspirational story. Thanks for sharing to the world!

PS. Your squat form is textbook-perfect! Mark Rippetoe would be proud, as I am proud of you!

PSS- With your mental toughness, I think you have what it takes to be a full-blown Olympic lifter. I challenge you to set a goal for yourself to be able to clean and jerk your bodyweight in six months! You can do it! I know you can :)

Thanks very much for your kind words; I'm glad you enjoyed the article - and that you think my squat form is all right. Nice to have a professional's approval!

I'm not sure about the challenge you suggest - a slight elbow strain is making even low-weight power cleans difficult at present - but I do find it fun, and satisfying, setting myself constructive physical goals, and achieving them. I might move on to clean and jerks once we've finished with SS; I think it's a beautiful lift when well done, though I've never yet tried it myself.

I have a question. My 16 year old daughter is in the very early stages of recovery from anorexia. She has 10 to 15 pounds to go. Before her anorexia she had very lovely muscles. Do you think she is too early in her recovery to encourage weight lifting?

It's difficult to advise one way or the other without knowing more about your daughter's situation: for example, how long has she been ill for, how had she previously acquired her 'beautiful muscles', how did she feel about those muscles, how well is her recovery going, did she do any exercise before becoming ill, and was the anorexia accompanied at any point by obsessive exercising? The dangers of introducing intensive exercise if there are psychological issues surrounding exercise, or if nutrition is not increased appropriately to enable muscle growth, are obvious. On the other hand, introducing a strength-training programme before the end of the weight-gain phase of recovery could certainly help promote a more positive, constructive attitude to recovery and one's own body, as well as providing all the important physical benefits of regenerating muscle, strengthening bone, and so on.

It's worth repeating the crucial distinction between what is commonly understood by weightlifting, i.e. a bodybuilding style of training which focuses primarily on physical appearance, and is usually practised by people who are (or become) obsessive and eating-disordered. Your daughter should also certainly not go and become a gym bunny, aiming to 'tone' (see http://www.stumptuous.com/lies-in-the-gym on why this word is meaningless). But if what you have in mind is strength training, i.e. the pursuit of better physical performance, then - depending on what the answers are to the questions above - then I'd tentatively endorse the idea. Starting Strength (http://www.amazon.com/Starting-Strength-3rd-Mark-Rippetoe/dp/0982522738/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8...) is an absolute must-read for a novice lifter, as it dispels many of the myths surrounding the sport, and provides a proper understanding of the basic lifts. The forums at the Starting Strength website (http://startingstrength.com/) can also be a useful source of information about questions relating to training and nutrition. The site I referred to above, http://www.stumptuous.com/, is all about lifting for women, as is http://gubernatrix.co.uk/.

My lovely daughter comes upon her beautiful muscles quite naturally - got them from her dad. Always did an avg amount of exercise and Eureka! beautiful body. Her anorexia hit when she became vegetarian and then began running for the first time to prepare for her first year on varsity field hockey.

She has definitely been exercising too much. She doesn't run any longer but I think she spends time in her room doing push-ups, sit-ups etc.

She has been ill for nearly a year, although I didn't note weight loss until last October. Dx in December.

My gut tells me it is probably to early to start weight lifting, but maybe when she's further along in her recovery. As you know, it is a long and frustrating path.

Yes, given your daughter's issues with exercise, it probably is too soon. Strength training is a very rewarding sport, but (or because) it also certainly encourages dedication in order to drive continued progress. For someone who has so recently become ill through a combination of obsessive sport (however different in type) and inadequate nutrition, a relatively demanding and consistent routine of the type required to be successful in strength training could be dangerous.

However, if you say she is still secretly exercising, then in a little while, when she's physically and mentally somewhat stronger, it might be helpful to suggest she consider swapping the push-ups and sit-ups in her bedroom for a more constructive training programme.

The journey back to health is always long and often frustrating, but I hope that as it goes on there will be more moments of relief, pleasure, and hope to sustain you all - and indeed that those moments help make the process self-sustaining for your daughter.

It's certainly true (in my opinion) that the bodybuilding lifestyle is much healthier than an anorexic lifestyle. Bodybuilders are able to achieve a low percent of bodyfat while still eating nutritious food and maintaining health and vitality.

One concern I have is that in your article you refer to what you call "gym bunnies" with condescending disdain. Sure, it is nice to run, walk or cycle outdoors. But each to their own. Many people are very happy about their half hour or an hour on a treadmill or stationary bicycle in the gym. It's a lot better than just being a "couch potato" and they enjoy many benefits from their various kinds of gym workouts. Disdainfully calling them "gym bunnies" while putting your own particular exercise routine on a pedestal is not very helpful. In future articles, perhaps there's a more positive way that you can communicate the benefits of weight lifting without criticizing what you call "gym bunnies".

Thanks for your message. It simply isn't the case that bodybuilders can reduce their bodyfat to clinically unhealthy levels while remaining physically and psychologically healthy. Two relatively recent studies on bodybuilding and eating disorders clearly show that many of the traits of bulimia nervosa are manifested by professional and recreational bodybuilders: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16618007 (male) and http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19391019 (female). As the abstracts make clear, more research is needed to ascertain whether there's a causal relationship here or not - maybe people predisposed to disordered eating gravitate towards bodybuilding - but it seems likely that bodybuilding could easily serve as an exacerbating environmental factor where there is a predisposition. Bringing one's bodyfat percentage down to single figures or close to it can usually not happen (and especially not for women) without profound physical and psychological effects related to the dietary restriction and levels of exercise required to get there. Whether or not it's acknowledged by the bodybuilder him/herself, it seems those effects may often be tantamount to having an eating disorder.

As for 'gym bunnies': I indicate at the end of the post why I consider the kind of exercise associated with that term - prolonged use of the treadmill or cross-trainer, for the purpose of calorie-burning/weight-loss - to be unproductive and unhealthy, for the general population and for those recovering or recovered from eating disorders in particular. No doubt that kind of exercise usually makes one physically healthier than being a 'couch potato' (though that doesn't hold if it's taken to extremes), but psychologically the negative effects may be substantial, and that in turn has its own physical knock-on effects too. There's a young woman at my gym who uses the cross-trainer every weekday, and stops when the calorie-counter tells her she's got to 1000. She moves slowly, and reads or watches something on her phone while she exercises. The primary effect of this exercise is, for her, to reinforce her disturbed relationship with food and her body, and to contribute to reducing her bodyweight to even more unhealthily low levels. The term 'gym bunny' was used in the photo caption as a shortcut to a set of familiar associations with precisely the kind of exercising I did mean to criticise.

Perhaps I did put strength training on something of a pedestal in this post; if I did, it came from the desire to communicate my excitement about the sport, and my sense of its potential benefits to others in similar situations. More recently I've started doing some running with a view to sprint training, and find that fun and rewarding too, but I'd recommend it much less wholeheartedly to someone still in the early post-recovery stage after anorexia. There are some forms of exercise that are more appropriate during that period than others, and in my opinion, the way of exercising associated with the term 'gym bunny' is one of the least helpful, while things like yoga and strength training are amongst the most helpful.

Anyway, maybe I'll write another post on exercise sometime, and modulate and/or expand on some of the claims I made here. I'll stick by the basic observation, however, that strength training can have benefits that cardio can't when recovering from anorexia.

Thank you very much for taking the time to write a response to discuss this very interesting topic. I think it's wonderful that you enjoy strength training and that you have altogether discovered a much healthier lifestyle. Yoga and/or meditation are also very positive ways to cope with life's stresses and anxieties.

There are different perspectives and I understand that your perspective is based on your knowledge and experience with eating disorders and those who exercise compulsively for long periods of time as part of their eating disorder. I agree with you that strength training can have benefits for those who are recovering from anorexia, but they should avoid cardio since this form of exercise might be very dangerous to them at their very low bodyweight.

The concern I had when I posted my previous comment was that, from the perspective of the general population, it is generally considered healthy to be active and to exercise. There are various ways to be more active and a great number of people enjoy their workout in a gym. I assume most people who go to a gym don't overdo it. They exercise moderately and find their workout energizes them, reduces stress, clears their mind and they feel happier. If they do suffer from anxiety, depression or post traumatic stress disorder (for example) - physical exercise is generally considered a positive way to cope with whatever concerns they are suffering from. A lack of physical activity is associated with mental health issues such as depression.
Ernst, C. and Olson, A.K., et al. (2006) Antidepressant effects of exercise: Evidence for an adult-neurogenesis hypothesis? Journal of Psychiatry & Neuroscience 31(2): 84–92. Retrieved from the National Center for Biotechnology Information website: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1413959/

Some recognize that excessive exercise increases cortisol levels (a stress hormone) and high cortisol levels adversely affects the physical body (ie. the immune system) and in some cases cortisol has even been associated with making it more difficult to lose weight. Therefore, it is wise to exercise moderately. Perhaps instead of generally criticising "gym bunnies", perhaps it's better to advise those who are passionate about exercise to exercise moderately and to be aware of the negative consequences of overtraining and exercising too much (ie. repetitive use injuries, high cortisol levels, etc.). Also to be more specific to distinguish recovering anorexics from the general population who enjoys exercising.

Thank you for the links to some of the research that associates some bodybuilders with eating disorders. I did not realize this before, because most of the bodybuilders and female fitness competitors appear to be very healthy both physically and psychologically. Perhaps there's a fine line between whether a particular perfectionistic bodybuilder is obsessive-compulsive and adheres to a strick diet and exercise regime because they might have body dysmorphic disorder, or the more positive perspective in which bodybuilding is promoted - that bodybuilders have developed a high level of self-discipline to consitently maintain their focus on achieving particular goals that they are passionate about.

Many of the articles that I have read about bodybuilding promote a very healthy lifestyle. The early bodybuiders of the 1970s and 1980s often pushed themselves through very long workouts; but eventually it was realized that long workouts are not necessary and even counterproductive. It is my understanding that bodybuiders exercise each bodypart once or twice a week for less than an hour. They cycle their training into periods when they are building muscle and then go through a period of 10-12 weeks to reduce bodyfat. During their "mass-building" phase, they still "eat clean" (ie. they don't eat junk food that doesn't have any nutrients). They eat about five or six healthy meals a day. Since they make sure they eat healthy: enough nutrients, protein and calories to build muscle - they are not driven to binge. They don't eat more than they need to. A healthy bodybuilding diet results in healthy blood sugar levels, and a healthy balance between leptin and ghrelin (hormones that cause a person to feel hungry or full). Also, they only do a minimal or moderate amount of aerobic exercise because they want to rest, repair and build their muscles.
During the 10-12 week phase to reduce bodyfat, they generally reduce their caloric intake by 500 calories to reduce one pound a week and increase their aerobic exercise. They still eat about four to six meals a day and make sure they get the nutrients they need and enough calories so they don't lose any of the muscle they worked so hard to build. Once they reach a certain goal (perhaps for a competition) they return to their "mass-building" phase. Since muscle burns more calories than fat, they are able to eat more than the general population and still remain lean.http://www.burnthefat.com/bodybuilders_fitness_models_fat_loss_secret.html

I completely agree about the generally positive effects of moderate exercise psychologically as well as physically. On the other hand, it seems to me unlikely that the kind of obsessive attention to the tiniest physical detail that’s required to be a successful bodybuilder could ever be without negative cognitive impact, and/or avoid reinforcing pre-existing psychological problems.

More generally, I’m highly suspicious of the concept of self-discipline as a positive: why should it be? Health and happiness aren’t about keeping one’s instincts in check, about simply acting as a consistently restrictive force on one’s own mind and body. Health and happiness emerge in genuine, sustainable forms when the validity of instincts and desires is accepted and when acting on them is allowed to be flexible and sensitive. So, for example, rigidly ‘self-disciplining’ oneself to go to the gym every evening, regardless of whether or not one feels tired or has something else to do, is not, in my view, how to become physically or mentally healthy (and the two are, importantly, inseparable); that holistic kind of health comes from an ability to adjust the baseline gym routine to how one feels and what else comes up in one’s social schedule.

Being passionate about the goal of physical self-‘improvement’ always seems an odd and dangerous thing to me too: achieving and maintaining a body that functions well and allows one to do the things one wants to in life is clearly a good thing, but making physical ‘perfection’ into the end in itself seems to miss the point that bodies are for living with. (Of course, physical perfection doesn’t actually exist, either, and the quest for it is bound to deteriorate quite rapidly into a futile attempt to keep up with constantly shifting goalposts.) Similarly, dividing up one’s life into ‘mass-building’ and ‘cutting’ phases may not necessarily have harmful physical effects (though done in an ill-informed manner it certainly could have: http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/sclark2.htm), but it seems obvious that the cognitive effects are likely to be, in many cases, along the lines of those observed in the papers I cited in my previous comment.

It isn’t quite clear what your connection with bodybuilding is, but your attitude to it seems strikingly naïve and idealised at times. For example, what makes you think that ‘they are not driven to binge’ during the mass-building phase? How could you possibly know this? Is it likely that a diet driven so exclusively by the desire for specific measurable outputs in one’s own body shape and composition would not result in cravings to be overcome (or not)?

As for the article you link to at the end, I hardly know where to start, and have no idea why you thought this an appropriate source to link to in support of your argument. The mixture in the author’s attitude of extreme objectification of the body, scorn of those who lack this attitude to their bodies, and partial insight into how pathetic this attitude actually makes him is painful to read. Venuto admits how awful and ‘depleted’ he looks in competition condition (and then pretends it was a joke), he admits the bodyfat levels achieved for competition are unhealthy, he acknowledges that calorie-restricted diets are only ever temporarily successful, he acknowledges his own immovable rule of 10% maximum bodyfat, he describes as ‘losers’ those who unsuccessfully diet, and ignores the fact that unsuccessful dieters and bodybuilders aren’t the only two population groups, he designates bodybuilders and fitness competitors as ‘athletes’, when their athletic achievements are negligible, and devalues true athletes by implicitly dismissing them as less admirable because less ‘lean’ than their bodybuilding rivals – and despite all this he speaks of ‘complete control’ of one’s body composition as an unquestionable positive. Plus, of course, all this is just in the interests of plugging his no doubt similarly brilliant e-book. In what sick universe is this a positive model for attitudes to bodily health and fitness?

I suggest that you re-read the articles on bodybuilding you mention with a slightly more sceptical attitude, rather than accepting bodybuilders’ own distorted testimony as truth.

How time flies! I cannot believe it has been 3 (three) years since I posted. Wow. At any rate.. It sounds like you are doing well.. Great job! Keep it up! Are you able to clean and jerk your bodyweight by now? 

I’m responding to your comment regarding the bodybuilding lifestyle.

I agree with you 100% on everything you said! Sounds like you are not only healthy physically, but you are also healthy mentally, spiritually and emotionally. Awesome.

This is NOT an attack on bodybuilders. I have a lot of competitive bodybuilder friends at the gym, and I’m also an active poster at bodybuilding.com. (Even though I don’t consider myself a bodybuilder. I go to that site to troll. I am a competitive Olympic lifter myself.)

Bodybuilding is a lifestyle. Their goal is to look as jacked and as shredded as possible on stage. Just because they ‘look’ healthy on the outside, it does not mean they are healthy (or happy) on the inside. As long you keep eating healthy, and as long as you exercise (lift weights to get strong, do some cardio for the heart), and as long as you don’t do these things to the extreme, your body will naturally go to a state where it is the happiest. No need to mess with this and create unnecessary imbalances by trying to achieve single digit bodyfat. That’s nonsense. But unless you choose to compete as a bodybuilder, then that’s a different story.

When my bodybuilding friends compete, they prepare months before they step on stage. I have personally seen the negative side of this lifestyle. They get weak and cranky and nasty, and they go through emotional roller coasters like a pregnant woman on a 2-month PMS (I know it makes no sense, but that is how I can best describe).

On top of these things they physically and emotionally go through, bodybuilding is a very, very subjective ‘sport’, much like a beauty pageant.. It’s not like an objective strength sport like powerlifting or Olympic weightlifting, where gravity does not lie.
If one wants to look ‘good’ then it can be achieved thru balanced nutrition and training and exercise. But it becomes harmful when things are taken to the extreme. Always remember: Health and Fitness. Health comes first.

And oh, btw, regarding bodybuilding.com. It is in the business of selling worthless supplements. To be brutally honest, most serious lifters (including myself) believe that the site is a joke. So just be careful when you read anything that comes out of that site.

It does! It's great to hear from you again! I still haven't learnt the Olympic lifts, though I have now found someone who could teach me. And I competed at the British Drug-Free Powerlifting Association's national meet last spring, which was great fun. Annoyingly, a minor but persistent lower-back injury has been keeping me off the weights in general for the past couple of months, but I'm a squad captain with the University powerlifting club this year, so I'm helping train plenty of others, including more women than the club has had before (i.e. any), so that's quite rewarding. I certainly don't feel my spiritual health is all that it could be right now - last year was a tough year, and brought home to me just how far I have to go in some emotional respects - but I do know what I'm aiming for, I think.

Thanks very much for your thoughts on bodybuilding; I find myself slightly at a disadvantage when commenting on the psychological side of it, since I don't actually know any bodybuilders, so it's great to have your thoughts here. And the comparison with a beauty pageant is spot on, it seems to me. I can't seem to find any decent studies assessing the cardiovascular effects of disproportionate muscle mass either; I don't know to what extent that's a real problem or a myth. I'll keep looking - or perhaps you can help here? Oh, and thanks for the thoughts on bodybuilding.com too! Some years ago I gradually came to the same conclusion about T-Nation...

Everyone is entitled to their opinion - but I'm astonished by your insults, ad hominem attacks and degree of dismissive scorn towards a subject you clearly misunderstand. You are not an expert. It's wrong to stereotype every bodybuilder as well as gym bunnies. There are many who happily follow the training and nutrition advice of professional bodybuilders to improve their physiques - but they don't compete. Therefore they don't go to the extremes of competitive bodybuilders. There are many very positive testimonies of people who have greatly improved many areas of their lives as a result of adopting the bodybuilding lifestyle. There are also positive testimonies of many professional bodybuilders as well. They openly share their training and nutrition programs and have made a positive difference in the lives of many people - yes, according to their personal testimonies. There is also scientific research in support as well - some of which is published in related bodybuilding books and magazines with references to these peer reviewed scientific articles.

Many of your comments seem very insulting and condescending. I don't think it's right to stomp on people who find happiness in a lifestyle that you find silly (bodybuilders or gym bunnies) or that you don't happen approve of.

If someone doesn't like art - is it right for them to insult artists? No. Many would keep their negative comments to themselves and respect the fact the people just want to be happy and find different ways to improve their lives.

@ Emily – Congrats on your decision to be a competitive powerlifter!! You’re a great inspiration. I hope you continue to inspire people worldwide!

@My Opinion – The internet can be and should be used to help others. Emily, in my opinion, is doing a great job helping others. This was the reason why I decided to participate in her blog 3 years ago.
The problem with internet, on the other hand, is that it could also be used to deliberately attack others – to your point.

However, somewhere in the middle of internet discussion is this huge gray area where emotions and true intents of the posters are very impossible to capture. Even with emoticons, the reader cannot truly ‘feel’ the writer’s message.

There is an old saying that “a telephone call is 1000 times worth than an email” for the very reason I just outlined.

Going back to your post, I can understand why you feel what you felt. I am no Ernest Hemingway. English is only my third language. Maybe what I thought in my head was not as clear as what I typed.

So let me explain:

Firstly, I am not attacking bodybuilders or anybody that do not do what I do. I already said that I have competitive bodybuilder friends in real life. In fact, I have the utmost respect for anybody that go to the gym and try to be health. I don’t know where you’re from, but here in the US 60% of Americans are ‘overweight’ and half of them (30% of the population) are ‘clinically obese.’ We have a health pandemic. In my eyes, I am happy when I see people hit the gym. Period. You may not believe this, but I consider bodybuilders, powerlifters, Olympic lifters, strongman, CrossFitters, or anybody that weight trains as “My Iron Brothers and Sisters.”

Secondly, my comment was towards ‘bodybuilders.’ In my head, my definition of a bodybuilder is ‘someone who wants to look great naked and competitively go on stage in a posing trunk with single digit bodyfat to COMPETE.’ In other words, a bodybuilder is a ‘competitive bodybuilder.’ The title is earned..

What I’m getting at is that semantics screwed things up…again…because it’s the internet. That’s why the internet sucks.

I will stand by what I said regarding the negative aspect of ‘competitive bodybuilding.’ And I will not apologize for it.

Yes, there are a lot of positive sides of bodybuilding.. I absolutely agree! But just like anything else in life, if you go to the extremes, bad things can happen. And being competitive, particularly in drug-infested bodybuilding federations, is a form of extremism.

Now, if someone goes to the gym to be healthy and to look good and to feel good, I think that is WONDERFUL! I wish more people went to the gym. But these gym goers are not bodybuilders in my book. They are Physical Culturist. Eugene Sandow coined the term over a hundred years ago. Physical culturist, which is really what you defined in your post, is a great thing because it balances the physical aesthetics of weight training, as well as the HEALTH (both mental and physical) and fitness aspects of it..

Thank you, Joel! I just came across this quote from Eugene Sandow, which seems to sum up his philosophy quite well: 'I am myself no believer in a special diet, still less in a rigid one, as necessary while training.' There are some other lovely titbits here too: http://physicalculturist.ca/old-time-strongman-diets/. I especially like the outline of a typical day in the life of Sandow, and the Saxon Trio's amazing 'health drink'. For the most part, they seem nicely pragmatic about all this stuff - if also distinctly eccentric at times!